Copy This T-Shirt Design Formula: My Full Strategy for More Print-on-Demand Sales

[00:01] on demand designing or you're brand new to print on demand and want to start for you cuz I'm going to go over the ways that I use KD to create designs and actually do it efficiently, effectively, and with all the new resources, how easy

[00:16] it can really be, even if you don't have any experience. And KD really has taken platform for me. I've been selling print on demand products for five almost six years now and I've used a lot of different apps but KD is my mostused

[00:31] platform and I really think that is because it was made with print on demand sellers in mind. So a lot of the tools that they have are specifically made for us as sellers which does make the process a lot simpler. Now if you are

[00:43] what it is it is a design platform that is used online. You can use it on any description below for you if you have not signed up yet. We're going to go and I'm going to show you my favorite ways to use it and a lot of hacks that

[00:57] you might not know about even if you do use KD already. So, let's get started and talk about my number one favorite thing and something that you can do in just a few moments on KD, which is use templates. On KD's website, if you go

[01:10] that says [music] templates. When you click that, you will see that there are thousands of different templates ready to use. Now, it's not just print ondemand templates. You'll see lots of different things here, but overall for

[01:22] t-shirts, hoodies, logos, there is so much here. Now, even for hats, different mugs, stuff like that. But what I specifically like is that up at the top, aesthetic, [music] niche, or something that I'm going for

[01:36] to help me get a template. So, for an example, if I wanted to type in Coette, it's going to give me a ton of Coette designs and templates that I can then work off of already. [music] Starting out with a template like this does make

[01:49] your design process a lot smoother, especially if you are new or maybe you don't understand text layouts or how to necessarily put a design together. That I wasn't really getting [music] the spacing and stuff. I just didn't

[02:02] can be super helpful cuz you can start completely [music] transform it. I'm going to create a similar academic style that is very popular on Etsy. And I'm going to go ahead and jump on a trend

[02:15] Valentine's Day because that's coming up. So, that's where I'm kind of going with my overall idea. But, you can, of course, take all the things that I'm trend or niche in your specific [music] store. So, I found this template that

[02:29] goes along with that academic style that is really popular on Etsy, right? It has the text on the top, some sort of emblem in the middle, and I'm just going to go template. So, now that I'm in here and I'm ready to start changing this, the

[02:41] first thing that I'm going to do is change my design ratio here and the size of my artboard because I want to make sure that my design is high quality for print on demand products. Right now, it's around 900 by 900 pixels, but I

[02:54] need it to be much larger. So, I can go ahead and stretch the canvas if I want, or I can go over here, make sure that you're selected, and under artboard size, we can scroll down and see t-shirt. And then if we go even further,

[03:06] different things here. They even have presets for specific companies. So, you'll see Printify t-shirt. I'm going to click that. And this just resized my design so that now I can select this and stretch it to actually match my canvas

[03:20] size. So, I want to do a type of Cupid University t-shirt cuz those seem to be go ahead and just type my text in as I would normally. You can change the distortion of the text as well if I wanted to do circle, angle, flag, wave,

[03:35] rise, arch, and so on and so forth. Or if I wanted to do it custom and drag the text on my [music] own. And all of these do have a way that you can actually manipulate the text yourself. So, these are just guidelines to work with. And

[03:47] text. And then I'm just going to change this to university. And I'm going to go ahead and remove these stars just by selecting them and clicking delete. Now I'm going to select this emblem here cuz I want to get rid of it. Now I could

[04:00] I want to share with you something called a replace feature. So on your left side here, you'll find where you can navigate your KD artboard. I'm going to go to illustrations and type in Valentine's Day or I could type in Cupid

[04:13] for. All of these designs can be used in your print on demand products, which is a really great thing about KD. And I'm going to scroll until I see one that I one that has a design style I'm looking for. You'll notice that there's a

[04:26] selected, I'm going to go ahead and click replace for the one that I want to replace it with. And as you see, when I hit replace, it keeps everything in the image. And now I can just keep manipulating this to however I'd like

[04:39] university down. gonna [music] move all of this up just by selecting maybe make university a bit bigger just by dragging it. And you can see here that I took the creating something of my own in just a [music] few minutes. Now before I move

[04:54] on, I am going to show you here that if you do not find an image over here that you like, maybe you're just not finding something to your liking, you can also use a lot of different features on KD such as their AI. So, KD's AI is

[05:07] more in depth in just a few minutes, but let's say that we did want something a little bit different here. If you scroll over to this button, you will see the AI gallery. Now, when you go through this, you can see all the different types of

[05:21] design styles. So, if I were to select one of these different design styles, I could create something [music] that looks similarly to that, but as a cupid design. Additionally, when you click on your image down here below, you can see

[05:34] what you want to create. There's a few options here, such as remix image or even generate video. I'm going to keep generate image. And here's where I can start generating something that I want instead. Now, down here, there's also a

[05:48] library of tons of different styles you can choose from. And the AI will create something in this exact style. So on browse styles, any of these that I select, it will automatically pick the best [music] functioning AI for the

[06:02] scroll through here, they have t-shirt quotes. You can literally create a design just with the AI, which is incredible. You can do a vector mascot. So if that's a design style, pop art, so on and so forth. And they have them

[06:16] again for typography, logos, photos, patterns, everything you can think of. just select the vector mascot. And then I'm going to describe what I want. I'm going to describe what I want. [music] So, I want a baby cupid with a

[06:30] bow and arrow. Bow and arrow. And it's always best to be um as specific as you the result that you're looking for. And KD does give you free AI credits on your account to go ahead and try this out. Now, this is telling me that ideoggram 3

[06:45] is the best for this, but I can also change it to nano banana if I'd like to. when I hit generate. So, as you can see, it gave me two things to choose from style I'm looking for. So, I can just keep going through here and get the one

[06:58] something that I feel is worth sharing with you because whenever you have that creating off of it. And sometimes we don't know exactly where to start with a helpful. [music] As you can see, I have lots of different things that I've

[07:12] different image styles, and it's a lot of fun. Let's keep editing my design. is centered. You can do that by the alignment tab. I can do center and middle just to make sure. And then it kind of changes things in the design a

[07:27] bit just to make sure. And I think I actually want to get rid of these two things here. Now I'm liking the way that everything is. And let's go ahead and select all which can also be done by command A. And then I'm going to go down

[07:40] something called color palettes which is really great here. So as you can see it me if I'm unsure what I want it to be. These are really helpful in more have like one color going on here, so it's not as effective for this, but it's

[07:55] something that's really cool. And you can even add in your own color palettes that's saved if you do have a brand kit. I'm going to do a nice red here. I like to use my color wheel. So, I'm just going to go and try to find a red that I

[08:07] like, something like that'll look good on print on demand products. And I'm just going to type in heart and look for a heart to put in the background. Again, doing that same thing of just scrolling. Let's say that maybe we like this one.

[08:21] Go like this. Now, bear with me here. What I'm actually going to do is I'm image, which is called working in layers. So, I'm going to go to these three top options here, and scroll down to send to back. That way, it's put

[08:34] manipulate it from behind the design and [music] Now, I'm actually not loving this heart so much, which is fine. I'm selected. And then I can go through here and find a different one. And again,

[08:46] just use that replace button. Okay, I like the way that this one looks. I'm [music] And then I'm going to select this angel and just make the inside color a bit of a pink just to kind of add another element to it. So now you

[09:01] something that was completely different from that original template, but I used like I was starting from zero, right? and I already have something that's Now, I'm just going to go ahead and add in some established, which is similar to

[09:17] in some established, which is similar to these designs. Let's do random ear. Okay, make sure these are centered. And then we will change the color of these as well. All right. And then just like that, I have a design that I really

[09:29] maybe change out [music] some of these fonts, I feel this is worth mentioning. Um, you can click here on your type face and there are thousands of fonts to choose from. And what's really cool as well is they have different tabs. So

[09:42] like handmade, sans seraps, really depends on what you're looking for. And also you can search for something. So if you want punk, you can search punk and you can search for bubble and they have all these bubble fonts. So it really is

[09:56] customizable and it's a way to again start with something and then create something of your own. Now, if any of this text I wanted to add a border or a shadow, that's under text shadow here. You can click this button, which is a

[10:08] different options you can do for borders or for different shadows. Now, just be in mind that when you are doing this for any type of print on demand, you will want to be aware um that you're not doing too much because sometimes it can

[10:22] that um when you put it on your print on demand product. Just make sure everything looks good and that if something's super hard to see for you, So, just keep that in mind. And one last thing here is that you may notice that

[10:35] this design actually has a texture to it. Now, that's can be accessed under button here. You can just select one of these and it will add it exactly to your page. You can then choose to mask the texture, which will keep it within your

[10:48] the full page, you would release the mask of the texture. Now, if you do want to do this, there are different options like soft light, color burn, multiply, play around with, and I would encourage you to do so because textured art does

[11:03] sell really well on Etsy for the right niches. I won't say for all of them, but like alpha mask looks kind of cool here. And then I can change the opacity if I don't want it to be super abrupt. So, here we go. I have this vintage style

[11:16] Cupid University design that I think looks absolutely great. And this is something that I can now export and start uploading to my print on demand products. Now, before I move on, I'm actually going to go ahead and copy this

[11:28] artboard. Now, I have two of my design. And what's great about this is you're able to work in one artboard, right? So, if I wanted to go ahead and change this whole design to pink, I can do that. And then that way I have now two different

[11:41] designs and variants for my print on demand products. Same if I wanted to make it all white, all black. If maybe I want to put it on a red sweatshirt and I would do that. So, I'm going to go ahead and just pick like a very [music] light

[11:54] pink so that I have it in two different colorways that I can use when I start uploading my products. Now, before we move on, I'm going to go ahead and do what is called a smartboard. So, if you have not used KD before or even AI, KD

[12:06] has this feature called Smartboards. And smartboards are a way that you can create multiple designs, mockups, variants, [music] graphics, so on and so already created. To create a Smartboard, you'll select it and hit add Smartboard.

[12:21] purple square on the side of your screen, and it's going to use exactly So, for example, if I wanted to change this and offer, you know, a suggestion of how I could make it better, I would put that here. So, I'm going to say keep

[12:36] put that here. So, I'm going to say keep this the same, but make it girly. Add this the same, but make it girly. Add pink hearts and stars. Okay, now I have it on Nano Banana. You can again change this if you want, but like I said, I do

[12:49] going to click generate. All right, so check this out. It took my art and added an extra element to it in just a few seconds. So, this is really cool. I out. And as you can see, it just took my

[13:02] better. you know, it it added something to it. And both of these designs are perfect. This one looks a little bit more full and exciting and girly just as I asked it. And you can keep doing this over and over. Like for this one, I

[13:14] over and over. Like for this one, I could say make it say lovers university. this and see what it comes up with. I find this to be so helpful. And I'm the end of the video on how else you can use this. So bear with me here. But it's

[13:29] honestly such a cool tool and is one of the main reasons why I recommend KD so much because not only can you create, you know, a ton of designs, but you can add another cupid. This one is a little bit wonky. So, that just tells me that I

[13:43] need to add to my prompt to make it make more sense, but looks really good in the I'm going to download all three of these. I'm going to go up to export, three. And then I can also change the pixels again to download them all. And

[13:58] I'm also going to change this to just 300 dpi to make sure that it is correct then I can hit download and I'll have all of these designs to upload to print of them as a zip file. So as you can see here that they all are in here as a zip

[14:12] something else cool that you can do within the artboard as well is actually create your mockups in here. And I find this really fun because you can do it two [music] ways. KD actually has a builtin mockup generator. If you hit add

[14:25] directly onto a mockup and you can change it out that way. And I can type in sweatshirt [music] and find one and it will actually put the design already on it for me as you can see. So I just can kind of move it around there. That's

[14:38] not my favorite way to do this though. I actually prefer to use their AI. So I'm going to do another smartboard and then say please put this design on [music] a white sweatshirt. And obviously you

[14:52] whatever it is that you're looking for. And then just like that, it created a mockup for me in just a few seconds using AI. And if I wanted to do it with background, if I wanted it to [music] be being worn by somebody, you can get

[15:06] specific about the characteristics. It's a really cool way to make your mock-ups and it takes just a few seconds as you saw rather than having to import your top of them. I really have been loving this and I will link another tutorial

[15:19] below if you want more info on exactly how to do that. All right, so now I have my designs. Let's upload one to a print on demand product so we can see how ahead and show you some bonus features of designing that I think are really

[15:32] what my design looks like. It's perfectly sized as you can see cuz we try out different colors and see what looks good for the exact sweatshirt and then preview it and it's ready to be uploaded. And look how beautiful this

[15:46] design that sells on Etsy. It looks good for all of the colors. And then I can later on upload those mock-ups I made in just a few minutes while also using um KD to make them. Now, along with templates, KD also has a ton of graphics

[15:59] and illustrations. As I said, these can all be used in your designs and for templates on the homepage, there's also graphics and you can scroll through and they have so many different graphic bundles for you to use. They really have

[16:13] everything. Like I said, they are up to date with the trends. This is a huge YTK fisheye trend that's going on. They have street wear. And if you click on one of these, it will show you a whole album of similar art that you can just drag and

[16:25] drop into your designs so that you don't have to constantly be using AI. You don't have to constantly be searching. It's already all put there for you. And graphics. You can use them as part of one whole design, which can be difficult

[16:38] together. Now, there's one more thing I want to share with you called design bundles. So, under when you're on your KD artboard, similar to where we found all of our graphics, which let me just let you know goes on and on and on.

[16:50] here, you can also go over here to templates. And on this screen, you're going to scroll down to where it says all-in-one design bundles. You can hit show all, and you'll see a lot of different curated bundles. And these are

[17:03] curated by artists. They even have a trend report one, which I really love. that you're looking for. Let's just click this wellness one here. You'll So then you can also go in within

[17:16] similar. But as you can see because I selected this, it just pasted next to my artboard a ton of different wellness things I can use. So all these graphics and fonts, mind you, are already curated for me to use in my design. And it's

[17:30] automatically just put this in here. Then it gives you all the stickers that you can use, patterns, colors, and then the fonts, which I think is so helpful in here and change it to whatever you want. So, [music] mental health

[17:45] nurse, right? Curve on our text. So, under transformation, make it a circle. [music] from here. Obviously, this isn't a nurse image, but whatever it is, right? And I can just keep going for my design and

[18:00] just drag and drop the elements that are already in the artboard for me, which can make things so much easier. And additionally, if you wanted to make your search for something. So, I'm just going to search for coffee. Okay, [music]

[18:13] let's say we want to go with this here. Perfect. And then I can create an artboard off of it. Two girls drinking coffee together on a at [music] a cafe.

[18:25] coffee together on a at [music] a cafe. keep the style the same, but have the keep the style the same, but have the girl walking a dog in the park. Okay. So, see how I'm building out graphics that can be used in multiple different

[18:37] designs, social media posts, pretty much anything, right? This could be used anywhere. But see how I'm taking this same exact graphic and creating multiple artboards. And I could do this 100 times. So, I just find that so so so

[18:49] cool. So creative. And I can also start off with the text as well. again. Add Smartboard. Change the [music] text to Cupid's text to Cupid's Social Club and make it pink. Beautiful,

[19:03] and on. Change this to 10 different graphics, 10 different phrases. I think overdo it. I want you to go ahead and get started. And I know that I've shared a lot in today's video. Everything's timestamped for you so you can go ahead

[19:18] and go back to something. save this for later for when you start designing if hope that you found it helpful. If you're not signed up to KD yet and maybe this, they do have a free plan and free AI credits. You can give all of this a

[19:32] description below. And I do use a KD pro plan now because I use it every single day, which is a paid plan, but I also have a discount code that KD gave to me and grab that if you do want to sign up for the pro plan after giving it a try.

[19:45] me know if this was helpful or if you have any questions in the comment have any questions in the comment section below.